Disclaimer: I do not own the Mortal Instruments series. Everything recognisable belongs to Cassandra Clare.
Only two days between the chapters, I think I deserve applause for that one. Hope you like the chapter.
I just want to add that I considered calling this chapter "the calm before the storm", which might tell you a little bit about what you can expect later.
Stepping through the doors of the Institute felt strange, like he wasn't supposed to be there. After all, just a few hours ago the whole population believed he was dead. In fact, they'd all seen him dead.
Jace sent Alec a nervous look as he entered the hall. "Are you sure about this? I mean, we could still try to find her." Jace opposed, pressing his jacket closer around his body. As strong as Jace wanted to appear, having to meet his parents after what he'd done, it scared the crap out of him. And Iwan, he didn't even want to think about what his brother thought of him.
"No, we're doing this. Clary was right, this has gone too far, it's not a game, it is war." Alec pushed his parabatai forward, urging him to keep going.
"We don't even know if they're here." Jace muttered.
"Sure we do." It was Isabelle who replied, her voice trembling from the same anxiety Jace was feeling. Even though Izzy, Alec and Jon had spoken and been in the presence of their parents, they'd still been dishonest and bluntly lied to their faces while everyone else were going through the grief of losing him. Losing Clary. Losing hope.
"It's 9 PM, they're having a Conclave meeting." Izzy smiled reassuringly to her friend, taking his hand in hers, "Do you really think they're going to be mad at you? Because if it was me, I would've been grateful you were alive. And I believe that's what your parents are thinking too." She began walking towards the large library doors.
His feet felt heavy, like he had a pair of chains attached to his ankles.
Jace had to forcefully calm himself down. He'd brought this upon himself by agreeing to Clary's plan, and he would do it again if he'd gotten a second chance.
Jon, who walked silently a few feet ahead of the others, opened the doors. The room was full of discussing voices, Jocelyn and Luke sitting at the end of the table, Robert and Maryse and Stephen and Celine on either side of the long table.
When they heard the door click open, the voices died.
A loud gasp escaped his mother's lips. Celine was the first to stand up, her blond hair fell from the side of her face over her cheeks and Jace could barely make out the meek smile spreading lightly on her face. "Jace!" she whispered, her voice so full of raw emotions it sounded like she had not used her voice in days.
"Mom." He replied, feeling the rush of guilt build up inside him.
"I'm sorry, there was no other way." He hurried to tell them before his mother embraced him. Her tight grip calmed his nerves and he didn't waste any more time, he closed his strong arms around his mother, hugging her back.
An almost inaudibly sob left his mother's lips as she let go of him. Not even a second before he was free, he'd been dragged into another tight hug from his father. "Don't ever do that again Jace, promise me." Stephen whispered into his son's ear as he let go of Jace.
"I won't." Jace answered, nodding his head in shame.
Jace looked around the room; suddenly feeling incredibly uncomfortable as he noticed all eyes in the room was drilled on him.
Jace opened his mouth to speak but a loud noise distracted him. The others looked behind the four teens as the door slammed open.
Iwan didn't say anything; he merely raced down the stairs and threw his arms around his brother's neck. "I hate you! I hate you so much!" Jace heard him whisper behind snivels. Jace bent down and tightened his grip on his brother, "Okay." Jace replied calmly, letting the boy say whatever he wanted.
"No, you're supposed to scoff at me for saying that." Iwan muttered, causing Jace to let out a suppressed chuckle into his brother's neck. "I'll make up for it later." Jace smirked, ruffling his brother's already messy blond locks.
"I didn't know if I could trust her when she told me she'd not killed you, Clary I mean, she talked to me, told me you were alive." Iwan explained as Jace looked at his parents again.
"Clary's been here?" Jon suddenly asked in surprised.
"So she wasn't lying." Isabelle mumbled under her breath.
"Yes, Clarissa entered the Institute early this morning, but.. sadly we don't know where she went." Robert replied, his voice stern, obviously conflicted by the scene happening in front of him. They were all upset the three other teens had lied about Jace and Clary, but at the same time, was there a point in bringing it up right away?
"What do you mean you don't know where she went?" Jace asked bemused, "You didn't let her leave? You must've known her coming here wasn't because she missed the Institute, she's planning something." Jace confronted the older Shadowhunters.
"We didn't get the chance to stop her, ehh.." Maryse replied, "Jocelyn she.." "I let her go." Jocelyn finished for the Lightwood mother.
Jon stepped forward, holding out the piece of paper Clary had written them before she'd left. "We've got this; it's a letter she wrote before she disappeared."
"Can I see it?" Luke asked, stepping forward towards his stepson.
"Yeah, sure." Jon replied, handing Luke the folded paper.
Luke pushed his glasses up his nose and began reading. A frown forming on his face as he scanned the handwritten note.
"This is war, and I am picking what side to fight on. There is no going back. Don't make everything harder than it already is." Luke read the last part out loud. "What does that mean? What happened out there?" He asked, looking from Jace to Jonathan and over to the two Lightwood children.
"Nothing." It was Alec who answered, "At least not that we're aware of."
"So something might've happened?" Celine stated in a question.
The four teens exchanged a few glances before Jace nodded, biting his lip nervously, "Yeah, something definitely happened. Same day she left, we found Clary passed out after checking out an old warehouse. She seemed fine when she woke up, and there were no injuries or anything." Jace reassured Jocelyn, who looked a little paler than usual.
"But something happened, she left when I tried to bring it up.. And that's, well, the last time any of us saw her." Jace finished awkwardly.
"Where is that warehouse?" Robert asked, "We should send someone there, to check it out." He began writing on a piece of paper in front of him.
"We already did clear the warehouse, that's the point. There wasn't any demonic activity." Alec told his father.
"What about Circle members?" Stephen suggested, "There is a possibility they would've attacked her when she was alone." He continued.
"No.. I don't think a fight would've been that silent. There wasn't an attack." Jace told his father.
Jonathan turned to his mother with a confused look, "You said you let her go, why would she need you to tell hr go? Where was she?" he questioned.
Jocelyn looked suddenly uncomfortable, her eyes flickering through the room, making no eye contact with the other people in the room. "Mom." Jon said confused, "Where was she?"
"The Magic Room.."
The voice came from Jace, who was staring at Jocelyn with intense golden eyes. "Was it?"
Jocelyn looked up at him, hearing the other mumble confused, "What are you talking about?" "Jocelyn?" Jocelyn locked her emerald green eyes in the younger boy's gold, and nodded.
"Oh God." Jocelyn brushed a hand through her red hair. "I didn't think, she needed to find something. I didn't think she knew, what if she found-" Jocelyn's voice raised into a panicked stutter.
"Found what?" Luke asked his wife.
"Jocelyn?" Celine asked, walking up to her bewildered parabatai. "Damn it." Jocelyn cursed.
"JOCELYN!" It was Celine who yelled at her, "Found what?"
"The Mortal Cup." Jocelyn answered before running out the door, heading for her private chamber.
xxxx
Clary flipped the card through her fingers nervously. One hour. She had one hour left, one hour to get the cup to her father, or else she would be starting a war. A war she would never be able to stop.
A golden tarot card was the answer they'd been looking for. Valentine had been looking for the Mortal Cup for years, and the damn answer lay within a damn tarot card.
Clary paced back and forth in nervous steps. Breathing deep breaths. "There's no going back now Clary." She told herself. "No going back now." If she repeated it to herself enough, maybe she would start believing it soon.
She clutched her stele in her other hand. "No going back." She whispered to herself again.
She placed the cold stele against the wall, feeling the familiar magic run through her fingertips as she began drawing the portal on the white brick wall. The portal materialized on the white walls, iridescent colours forming a hole before her.
Clary waited a few minutes, watching the colours move around inside the circle. She waited until she saw the portal started to shrink. And then, she stepped through. The card clutched tightly into her hand.
She landed outside the manor. Maybe she wasn't welcome inside the manor any longer. Clary laughed deridingly. The cold winter ground soaked her shoes in icy water and Clary started walking through the thin layer of snow to get to enormous manor.
Opening the heavy door to get inside felt strange. When she'd left her home last time, she'd believed it would be the last time she ever stepped inside the luxurious home of Valentine Morgenstern, but when had things actually turned out the way Clary thought they would?
Inside the manor she was met by two Circle members, she'd seen their faces before, but couldn't remember their names. "So you did decide to show up?" one of them asked, leading her through the halls.
"Looks that way, don't it?" Clary answered sarcastically.
"What's the point? You don't have the cup. Just missing daddy?" the other asked, laughing behind her. "Shut up." Clary snapped at him, sending him a hateful glare.
"I'm here to speak with my father, not you." Clary increased her speed.
"You don't even know where he is little Morgenstern."
"I've lived her for the past fifteen years; I think I can find him without you two escorting me." Clary replied cynically.
The two Nephilim stopped, apparently letting her go on her own. Clary pocketed her stele, touching the handle of her short knife, making sure it was kept out of sight.
It didn't take more than five minutes for Clary to find her way through the labyrinth of a home she'd lived in. She stood outside her father's chamber watching the card glimmering between her fingers. A deep inhale and she pushed the doors open with as much force she could put into one push. The doors slammed against the walls inside the room.
Her father sat in his chair. The twenty other circle members in the room jumped back as the doors flew open, but him, Valentine simply looked up from his papers. "Clarissa." His words echoed through the large room. "How nice of you to join us this fine evening."
Clary didn't answer him. Her feet felt like two blocks of cement as she walked up to him. Her hair flowing behind her, she felt the anger her father sparked inside her flare up, and if she didn't know better she would think her eyes had turned black from the fury of seeing him sitting there, smiling warmly at her.
Clary slammed the tarot card brutally against the desk. Making some of the circle members move forward to see what she'd done. "What is this?" Valentine asked angry. "I told you to bring me the Mortal Cup Clarissa, not a lousy tarot card."
He held up the card, inches away from her face, "You should look again." Clary snapped at him, meeting his dark eyes with a heated smirk.
A roaring laughter built up in the room as the Circle members saw the little card in their leader's hand. Bellowing against the walls, twenty loud voices.
"QUIET!" Valentine yelled, holding up his hand.
"Are you trying to tell me, this is the Mortal Cup?" He watched her with a hard gaze.
"Yes. I think you underestimated my mother's powers, father." Clary hissed. "Good luck trying to get the damn cup out of that card." Clary laughed a jeering laughter that rang through the now silent chamber.
She met her father's eyes one more time, "I did what you asked, now, you leave the Nephilim out of your fucked up war." She spat at him, watching his anger evolve in his facial expression.
Clary turned around, facing the shocked members of her father's Circle, the path was cleared once again, and Clary started to walk down the stone floor.
"Lock the doors!" Valentine raised his voice in command.
Clary turned around, watching her father's wrath pore out. "You are not going anywhere until we have that cup Clarissa." He spoke calmly, which scared Clary way more than him yelling at her would've.
"I cannot help you there father. I know nothing more about this spell or rune than you." Clary replied calmly, watching the men closing the doors shut.
"I didn't raise a liar!" Valentine laughed angry. "You will help us, even if force is the only way to do so."
"Take her stele; she won't be getting out of here unless that cup," Valentine held up the card before his men, "Is standing on my desk. IS THAT UNDERSTOOD?"
Clary watched as the twenty or so men moved their eyes away from their leader and over to Clary. Two Nephilim stepped forward, ready to take the silver twig out of her grip. Clary stretched out her hand, holding the stele out for them to take.
With the other hand she closed a firm grip around her knife. When the man snatched her stele, Clary attacked.
The knife bashed into the guy's neck. Crimson blood pouring from the falling Shadowhunter's wound. Clary knew she had already lost the fight. One down, but there was still at least nineteen against one.
Clary struck again, hitting a younger, maybe twenty years old, Shadowhunter in the chest. She'd seen him before; he was the son of one of Valentine's inner circle members. Brian Crowstone. Her father had told her he would be a good member of the inner circle when he aged. Now, he wouldn't be anything more than dead.
Someone caught her arm, twisting it around. Clary screamed. Something snapped. She didn't drop the knife, but her arm, definitely broken.
The knife was forced out of her grip, both arms pinned behind her back. The pain form her broken hand kept her adrenalin level up, she kicked out at the guy holding her, using all her extra strength to get away.
Something cold ran through her. Her body started to shake, cold perspiration soaking her clothes instantly. Someone stood before her. "Now darling, you don't want to hurt your own father, do you?" he asked, the stele twisting in his grip.
Clary felt him lift her as her legs stopped working, he'd put a binding rune on her, preventing her legs from supporting her weight. "You're not my father." Clary gritted between chattering teeth.
xxxx
Jocelyn opened the door to her private chamber with an unsteady, shaking hand. How could she have been that mindless? In that moment she'd completely forgotten all the treasures her chamber hid from Shadowhunters who would use them to do evil. She didn't think Clary would do anything like that, or at least she hoped she wouldn't.
Jocelyn walked inside; the room was turned upside down. Clary had definitely been her, and she had been looking for something. Luke followed her after she'd studied the room for quite a bit. He looked around, he was one of the few people who had actually been inside the room before, but still, he looked amazed as the rooms grey coloured walls changed and transformed before his eyes.
"I think it's safe to say she didn't just miss the Institute." Luke mumbled when he saw the mess Clary had left behind her.
Jocelyn nodded sadly. "Yeah." She picked up the deck of cards lying across the desk. Looking through the cards two times, three times, four times. "Damn it."
"It's not here. Clary took the card." Jocelyn whispered upset, meeting Luke's eyes with a desperate glint in her eyes. "I don't understand. How could she know it was the card?" she asked, stepping out of the room followed by Luke.
The other New York Conclave members stood outside waiting for them to step back outside. "So?" Celine asked with a hopeful tone to her voice.
Jocelyn shook her head, avoiding eye contact with her friends.
"I'm so sorry." She exclaimed, "but the cup is gone."
xxxx
Clary let her father's followers tie her up, there was little she would be able to do to stop them anyway. With no weapon, and no feelings in her legs, she was an easy match.
"You should tie her hands harder, you know how well she's trained, even I could get out of that knot." Some said mockingly behind her.
"Her arm snapped in two places, she won't be able to use it properly." The one tying her up informed, but the robes around her wrists tightened immensely and Clary bit down on her lower lip as her arm erupted in splintering pain.
The room they'd put her inside was smaller than most of the other rooms in the manor, it was also in one of the lowest floors. Clary had never liked being down here, the biting cold air and dark windowless space didn't attract much good attention.
"You can just kill me now, I'm not helping you." Clary exclaimed, pushing her hands closer to the back of the chair she was sitting in.
"We're not killing you until that's the order Morgenstern." The man shoved her head down as he hit the back of her head, "Give it a few hours and you'll be begging to help us." The same man laughed into Clary's ear.
"I don't think so you idiot." Clary snapped back, sitting up straighter.
Behind Clary she could hear a door click shut, and a loud voice filled the room, "Now sweetie, don't draw conclusions too early." It was Valentine's voice, dark and heavy.
He stepped past Clary and sat down on the chair in front of her. "I have to say Clarissa, I am incredibly disappointed with you, leaving like that, with no warning.. Truly a shock."
"I can't disagree with you father, truly a shock. But if you look at it from my point of view, I think you would find it is you who've disappointed." Clary told him coldly.
"Of course I can see that you would think that my dear, but what you did not see, is that I kept you strong, fed you with hate to raise you a stronger warrior, a better fighter, a more collected mind. And nobody can disagree with the truth, that I accomplished just that." Valentine smiled warmly at his daughter. "Not even you."
"You raised me to be your solider, not your daughter."
"Yes, but that doesn't mean you cannot be both Clary." Valentine closed his slim white fingers over Clary's cheek, placing his thumb along the side of her face, covering her red scar perfectly.
"One would think a father wouldn't tie up his own daughter." Clary spat at him, revealing his hidden anger. "Oh Clary, if you had only obeyed when I trusted you." He smirked, slamming the back of his hand against her cheeks.
"I want you two to check up on her in five hours, see if she's ready to be a bit more cooperative." Valentine told the two guards as he left the room with an anger filled expression shining in his face.
"Yes sir."
xxxx
"First of all I don't understand how you got the cup in the first place?" Stephen asked when they had gathered around the table in the library.
Jocelyn sighed, brushing her fingers through her messy red hair as she began to explain, "Before the Uprising, Valentine found a way to steal the cup. I know he intended to make some sort of new race of the Nephilim. An army is my guess, someone who would earnestly follow him until the very end." Jocelyn looked around the room; they were all there, even the younger ones, including Iwan and Max.
"So, you took it?" Celine asked, her expression showed the anger she felt for her parabatai, Jocelyn had not told her about the cup, never even hinted towards knowing where it was.
"Yes, I managed to take it away from him, but feeling as if it wasn't safe to retrieve it to the Clave, I, I simply hid it." Jocelyn shrugged.
"Inside a deck of cards?" Robert asked baffled.
"No, not a whole deck of tarot cards. Just one." Jocelyn explained with a tired voice.
"Still, how did you do that?" Maryse spoke up for the first time in a while.
"I used a rune, hiding the cup inside the card."
"Well, is there a way to track Clary? Make sure she won't do something she'll regret?" Jon asked, looking straight at his mother as he spoke, their green eyes met, a comforting smile spread across Jon's lip as he saw his mother's concerned gaze.
"To be honest," Jace answered, "I think it too late for that now."
"We have to inform the Clave, if this is the beginning of a war, we should warn them." Stephen told them; standing up from the chair he was sitting in at the end of the table.
Isabelle looked up; her dark brown eyes warm in the lights of the chandelier hanging above their heads. "Don't you get it?" she asked him, looking around the room with a saddened glance, "Clary didn't start a war by taking the Mortal Cup. She's trying to prevent it; we are the ones starting a war. We are the ones who started a war the day we took Clary away from her father."
xxxx
Clary was left alone in the room, and she had no idea what the time was. She could've been there for a few minutes, of a few hours. There was no clock to tell her the time.
Footsteps moved outside the room and Clary tried to turn her head around enough to see who was coming.
The light feet stepped past her, revealing Maggie, her auburn hair tightened into a ponytail at the back of her head. "Oh Clarissa, what have you gotten yourself into?" she asked in a low whisper.
"Maggie?" Clary asked confused, "What are you doing here?"
"I just heard about you being here. What do you think you're doing?" she asked angrily, but a hint of fear showed in her strong voice.
"As my father told me to do." Clary answered sarcastically.
Maggie smiled slightly at Clary's stupid reply, "No, you're killing yourself." She stated, "You know your father better than anyone else, he's been obsessed with finding this cup for years, do you really think he'll let you live if you don't help him?" Maggie asked, brushing Clary's sweaty strains of hair away from her face.
"I don't really care anymore. He can kill me if that's what he wants." Clary explained in an angry voice, her eyes staring at the floor between Maggie and herself.
"No Clary, please, if it ever comes to that, you have to help him, do whatever you need to do to save yourself." Maggie cupped Clary's face in her hands, forcing her to look at her, "Promise me that."
Clary met the woman's orange eyes, "Can I ask you something Maggie?" Clary asked angry.
"Of course."
"If someone used you for their purpose only, telling you what to do, how to do it, making sure you grew up without a childhood to look back at, filled only with horrible memories of abuse and discomfort. Then when you finally learn the truth, that there is actually someone out there who care about you, not the warrior version of you, but you as in the person you want to be, but can never truly become.. Because you are bound to the person you were forced to develop into, you can never look back at the life you wanted because someone forced you to kill and shaped you in the most horrible ways one could think of. If that was the case, would you care if you died?" Clary felt her eyes burn, but they stayed dry. Her heart beating fiercely behind her ribs, and Clary looked at Maggie as the woman took in the passionate words.
Maggie scanned Clary with careful eyes, sad, deep eyes. "Is that really what you feel Clary?" Maggie asked hurt.
"Yes."
"Yes, I would still care if I died." Maggie answered Clary's question, meeting her emerald eyes with a sad smile. "And you should too."
"I won't help him, not after everything that's happened. And I won't beg for my life either." Clary looked away, her expression growing serious and darker with every second.
Maggie looked up from the young girl's face when she heard the voices grow louder behind the door. "I have to go, but Clary, please at least consider it."
"I already have, the answer will always be no!" Clary barked after her as the woman disappeared out the door, locking it shut behind her.
Please leave a review, I worked super hard on getting this done as fast as I could and if all of you give me a tiny review after reading this, I can promise another quick update.
Love you guys so much!